A culture blog.

Month: August 2018

The 1990s, like the countless decades before them, were no time at all in which to come of age as a queer teenager in America. Desiree Akhavan’s novel adaptation, The Miseducation of Cameron Post, takes 1993 as its host year, and charts the stay of its eponymous protagonist at God’s Promise, a gay conversion therapy centre. … Continue reading The Miseducation of Cameron Post

Political wrangling is in vogue, alongside populism, widely-disseminated lies and the utter absence of morality – what better time to revisit the life of Rome’s great statesman, Cicero? This epic double play from Mike Poulton, adapting Robert Harris’s novels, runs to 7 hours but feels consistently fresh and portentous. It is high entertainment, with pointed … Continue reading Imperium

Films are often praised for doing what they advertise on their tin - simplicity is no sin in and of itself. When that tin looks like it'll contain a monster film of questionable quality, though, this straightforwardness is still a burden. Cockney wedge Jason Statham is our hero, a wisecracking and nominally harrowed ex-diver named … Continue reading The Meg

Another week, another countdown set to 15 minutes, ticking down the time to disaster. Except, in Ant-Man and the Wasp, the stakes are rather lower than in other recent blockbusters. A human tragedy is risked, yes, but one involving at most a handful of victims. Scott Lang, Paul Rudd’s Ant-Man, is under house arrest, as … Continue reading Ant-Man and the Wasp